September 02 - September 10 2017

On the 12th of September 2007 the III ELBRUS RACE competitions to the Western Summit of Elbrus (5642 m) were over, among the participants there were athletes from three countries: Russia, Kyrgyzstan and Poland were over. This time the eminent mountaineering runners from Kazakhstan, champions of 2006 Competitions D. Urubko, A. Puchinin and S. Sharipova did not take part in the races; all of them stormed summits above 8000 m high.

However, the geography of the participants from Russia extended: Moscow, Saint-Petersburg, Samara, Lysva, Magnitogorsk, Nevinnomyssk, Tenerda, Terskol. The competitions were carried out in two classes: Classic and Extreme.

Qualification contest up to the Pastukhov Rocks was scheduled for the 10th of September, but the night before the 10th September a fierce snowstorm with thunder and hurricane broke out and the visibility fell down to 0. All this lasted about 36 hours. The officials decided to cancel the qualification.

The day before the main starts the weather had softened. It became clear, cool, but windy; on the day of the races the wind, sometimes very strong, was blowing constantly, some of the mountaineers even had slight frostbites.

Now let us pass to the results. In Extreme –the race from the valley Azau (2400 m) up to the Western Summit – the champion was Semen Dvornichenko from Bishkek (Kyrgyzstan) with the result of 4 hours18 minutes. Last year Denis Urubko had 3 hours 55 minutes 58 seconds, but considering the fact that Semen is only 26 and it was blowing hard, Urubko’s record cannot be regarded as unshakable. The second one was Sergey Surmonin from Moscow, with the time of 6 hours 14 minutes.

In Classic from Bochki up to the Western Summit there was a hot contest for the first place between the Russian Roman Gubanov (who was the second last year) and Sergey Siliverstov from Kyrgyzstan, who had run from the valley Azau last year and was the third. Gubanov won with the time of 2 hours 51 minutes 38 seconds, Sergey was 2 minutes behind.

I would like to congratulate Mr. Roman Gubanov individually on his success in climbing the world’s second summit K-2 (8611 m), as a member of the expedition of Krasnodar, from which he returned less than a month ago. As to the ladies, the winner was Yekaterina Andreevna, also from Kyrgyzstan, with a very decent result of 3 hours 41 minutes, which she achieved on her 20th birthday; she has got the whole world before her except Lenin Peak she won last summer.

I congratulate all the participants with the victory over themselves and the mountain, and all volunteers are welcome to the next races over the slopes of Elbrus next year.

On behalf of all the participants and the officials I express my sincere gratitude to the chief facilitator of the competition – the company of Top Sport Travel and personally to its head, Master of sports Nikolay Shustrov.